Cellar Door & Dining Room

Cellar Door

On Public holidays and School holidays, we now offer a free standard wine tasting or for $5 a premium wine tasting to taste our reserve wines. All Estate Chardonnay & Macedon Ranges Pinot Noir as well as our Bendigo Shiraz & Cabernet are part of our cellar door wine tasting experience.

Our Cellar Door is open 7 Days, 10am - 5pm

Groups of 7 or more a $5 tasting fee is required, but redeemable on purchase.

Dining Room

Our goal is to make wine for the people who drink it, superb wine that should be shared with excellent and thoughtful food in the company of family and friends. It seems natural therefore to offer this experience at our cellar door, which is why we created the dining room at Passing Clouds.

We offer a la famiglia style lunch which is more like having lunch at a friend's house than going to a restaurant. And just like having lunch at a friend's house, it's nice to let them know you're coming over. Given that it's not a huge space, we can't always cater for unannounced guests, so please give us a call and let us know you're coming so that way we can make sure there's plenty of food to go round.

Our dining room is open Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday for lunch from 12 noon. For bookings of 6 people or more we require the three course la famiglia style menu for the whole table - a selection of the whole menu, sharing style at $55 per person. Bookings are essential to avoid disappointment.

Starting on Monday February 5th 2018 we are very excited to be delivering a Winemakers Lunch - Mondays at Passing Clouds, $30 per person. Two courses - shared main, sides and cheese including a glass of vino. (excluding public holidays).

On public holidays we only offer a fixed three course shared menu and we are closed Good Friday, Christmas Day, Boxing Day & New Years Day.

PS. We have chosen not to offer tea and coffee. As we are a winery, the focus of our dining room is to showcase our wines and essentially is an extension of our cellar door. Coffee is especially demanding on one's palate and takes away from the wine we hope you're enjoying. As winemakers and not restaurateurs, we appreciate your understanding!

The dining concept.

Down in the winery, every Friday during vintage, we would all look forward to lunch. Because it was 'Spit Day'. Each of us took turns in supplying meat, bread, salad, vegetables and of course, wine.

The meat always changed. One week it was pork, next it would be lamb, beef and then chicken. Graeme brought a stunning four pound rainbow trout he'd caught in Tasmania one day. It was then carefully prepared and placed on the spit over the heat for an hour or so until it was cooked to perfection.

The fresh bread, salad and vegetables were brought to the table along with a bottle or two concealed in brown paper bags to taste blind and quiz one another of the wine's true identity - the moment we'd been waiting for all week - let the feasting begin.

We wanted to share this experience with everyone and the Dining Room at Passing Clouds captures this ‘la famiglia’ style of eating. Our little 10 gallon drum converted spit roast wasn't up for the task so we've upscaled in a big way and brought in a beastly half tonne charcoal fire pit we've dubbed 'Prometheus'.

(Prometheus was a Titan in Greek mythology who stole fire from Mount Olympus and gave it to mankind. What a legend.)

As our style was far from polished, (we're winemakers after all, not chefs), we would need some help so we could realise our concept in full and we were blessed when our friend Chef Cameron McKenzie joined the team.

Once the fire is built each morning, Cameron selects cuts of meat from neighbouring farmers and sets them slowly roatating over the specially sourced charcoal.

A beautiful fire engine red manual vintage Berkel meat slicer sits proudly behind the bar offering paper thin ribbons of cured meats, with toasted local bread and homemade pickles. Cheese has always been a staple of our lunches, so they feature in the dining room too, along with Cam's own charcuterie.

Below the vineyard, under the windmill on the hill, our organically farmed vegetable garden keeps turning up the goods. To name but a few - zucchini, radish, eggplant, carrot, daikon, beetroot, kohlrabi, fennel, garlic - have all been pulled straight from the garden, prepared and then used that day.

The menu is drawn up new on the chalkboard each morning and reflects the fluid nature of cooking with the seasons. See below for example menu.

What we're eating now - Autumn 2018

Want to visit the local wineries and not have to worry about driving? We've come up with the perfect package with Daylesford Wine Tours, click here for more information.

All orders are processed and distributed by Passing Clouds. It is against the law to sell or supply alcohol to, or obtain alcohol on behalf of, a person under the age of 18.
ABN: 52 092 476 090 | Liquor Licence Number: 32606072